Backstage 42: Rough Trade
by Aadler
Summary: Re-exploring old acquaintance, with a vengeance.
1. Part 1

**Rough Trade**  
>by Aadler<br>**Copyright November 2014**

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><p>Disclaimer: Characters from <em>Buffy the Vampire Slayer<em> and _Angel: the Series_ are property of Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, Kuzui Enterprises, Sandollar Television, the WB, and UPN.

This story is a remix, done for Round 4.2 of the Circle of Friends Remix, of "Blessed Relief" by M. Scott Eiland.

**Note:** The story contains references to events depicted in "Oaxaca Nights".

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><p>Part I<p>

They made a striking pair, the two in the diner, and any onlooker could be forgiven for leaping to some obvious conclusions, or at the very least for calculating the likeliest possibilities. Aspiring actress and the bad-boy ex she'd tried to leave behind? Mid-level model getting her weekend thrill with a little rough-and-tumble? A recruiting pitch, offered to someone who had outgrown gullibility but who might, perhaps, have learned her own limitations: a few days' work with an independent film company, very tasteful, but nude …?

'Working girl' and her 'manager', however, could be pretty well ruled out. He would be too flashy for this neighborhood, too conspicuous: out of place, vaguely threatening, attracting far too much of exactly the wrong kind of attention. The black leather duster, the bleached and slicked hair, and most of all that face: knifelike cheekbones, icy blue eyes, a sensuous mouth that could so easily twist with cruelty or curl in jeering … No. Bad news there, and far too obvious, he simply couldn't operate in this environment. The woman, yes, ripe and sleek, with haughty eyes and smooth dark glossy hair, an automatic aura of class and challenge and deep-buried passion; she'd be a natural in the business, she'd be a _sensation,_ but only with a suitable (and less flamboyant) handler. Whatever this was,it wasn't that.

It was a mystery, exotic and enticing. Unless one was close enough to hear their conversation.

"I don't give a toss whether you're hungry or not," the man was saying. _"I_ want some wings. Spicy, mind, with ranch dressing and horseradish for dipping."

"I didn't come here to feed you," the woman retorted. "Not in any sense of the word. And why would you bother with something that won't nourish you anyhow?"

The response was a snort. "Why do you order that silly caffeine-free diet swill? No sugar, no calories, no zip to it: what's the point?"

"I like it," she defended. "I just like the taste, okay? God, if you had any idea the things I _do without,_ you'd never —"

"Yeh, yeh, cry me a bloody river." He leaned back in his seat, grinning in a way that showed very white teeth. "But that's the answer: I just like the taste. And since you're the one wanting a favor here, it'd be a good idea to keep me happy."

"Nuh-uh," she shot back. "You're not doing me a favor: _Giles_ did me a favor, by sending you to me. If you won't help, there's the door. If you will, let's get to it. Either way, we're not dickering here."

He eyed her with amusement and speculation. "Quite a piece of work, aren't you? You've come a ways from the high school gossip courts."

The young woman sniffed. "The only thing you know about high school is when you tried to turn Parent Night into a vamp buffet. Please: you were part of my formative years, isit any surprise that I can take you in stride now?"

"I never gave you the attention you really deserved," he pointed out. "Always too obsessed with the bloody Slayer … No, if I'd ever paid you proper notice, you'd treat me with more respect." He tilted his head, one eyebrow rising. "You _are_ afraid of me, though. Been so long, I'd almost forgot howit felt. — Handleit pretty well, you do, but you're definitely afraid."

"You're a _vampire,"_ she said. "The Sunnydale crew may think you're harmless just because Uncle Sam wired a bug-zapper into your skull, but I'm taking nothing for granted. Besides, if you weren't dangerous, what good would you be to me?"

"Dangerous," he repeated. "Yeh, that's a word. I'm dangerous. I'm a bloody animal. And it's nice to have somebody recognize it." He settled back into the booth with languid grace. "I may help you out here just for that. Or I may tell you to go take a flyin', just to show I'm no pitiful wanker beggin' for scraps. But I'm listening, at least. You've got that much."

"Color me thrilled," she said. "Look, Spike —"

He leaned toward her. "Oh, are we on a first-name basis now?"

Her answer was a scornful _phht!_ "According to Angel, you picked out the name for yourself, so I figure it's what you want to be called. Are we going to get down to brass tacks here, or would you rather waste more of our time posturing? Because we do have a little deadline problem, that being another reason you're here at all."

"Wondered about that." He set his elbows onto the table. "Right outta nowhere, Jeeves tosses me some car keys 'n' a set o' directions and says it'll be worth my while if I can meet you here quick an' give you a hand. Unexpected, like. I mean, I'm barely past bein' tied up in Droopy Boy's basement, they treat me like some toothless soddin' lion, the Slayer makes cracks about 'flaccid' —" He stopped, expression going thunderous as she visibly bit her lips to keep from laughing. "Yeh, that's right. Have a good chuckle at the Big Bad bein' brought low, and just _see_ how much help you get from me!"

"Sorry," she said, though she didn't look it. "I could picture her face when you said that about her making cracks. World-saving hero and all,it still doesn't stop her from getting her little digs in … and she doesn't let up if her target can't hit back, either."

"Can't fault her there," he observed grudgingly. "Havin' mercy on weakness, that's a pansy's game. Which you'd know all about, hangin' with the Big Poofter. Doesn't mean I much like it."

"So can we get back to the main subject?" she demanded.

He set his mouth in a stubborn line. "Soon's I get my wings."

"Again with the wings?" She made an extravagant gesture of impatience. "God, you're like a two-year-old! 'Gimme, gimme, gimme, I want my Happy Meal' —"

"Time was," he broke in, "Happy Meal would'a meant _you."_

She regarded him with flat, steady eyes. "Yes, well, that time isn't now, is it?"

"Wings," he repeated, just as flat. "You give me the score while I nosh down. Put me in a good mood, I might even feel like goin' along with whatever you've got in mind."

"Okay, fine, haveit your way." She stood and started for the main counter, paused to glare back at him. "Just understand something: when Giles saidit would be worth your while, he meant they'd owe you. And they take that kind of thing seriously, or _I_ wouldn't have been able to call in such a big favor on such short notice. I'll cover your damn spicy wings, but don't think you can shake me down for more. I'm stripping the petty cash fund asit is."

He grinned at that. "Sounds like Peaches isn't doin' too well with the whole 'help the hopeless' gig."

"It's a daily struggle, believe me," she muttered, and turned to continue on to the counter.

He sat back again in the booth, and to himself he said, "Well, what d'you know? Mood's gettin' better already."

~ – ~ – ~

"There's an amulet," she said once the wings had arrived. "I need it."

"There's always an amulet," he shot back. "Bleedin' West Coast's thick with 'em. D'you know Los Angeles has twenty times as many mystical artifacts, per square mile, as any place in Europe or most parts of Asia? And Sunnydale's ten times worse than that."

"You should know," she observed. "You went scrounging for enough of them. And the one I want, like always, has a guardian. Or guardians. That's where you come in."

"Right," he said. " 'Cause doin' violence to the demon set is all I'm good for now."

"Damn straight," she returned. "Lucky for us both, you're _really_ good at it."

"Killing somethin's as good a way as any to while away the hours." He looked her over critically. "If this amulet thing's so important, why don't you have your own lot huntin'it out?"

She looked away, and her tone was not quite so firm asit had been. "They're busy with something else. This just came up, and I didn't have the time to pull them away from what they're already doing." Then she seemed to come back to herself, and met his gaze steadily. "The really, vitally urgent thing they're already doing."

"Right." Spike settled back, studying her with a thin smile that grew in satisfaction as she refused to look away. "An' why call for me instead of one of the goody-two-shoes bunch you used to belong to?"

"I _never_ belonged with them," she replied sharply. "I dropped in now and then to lend a hand, but they were _miles_ below me and they all knew it."

"Meaning I'm not?" The smile deepened. "Besides, you just tried to slide away from the question: why not one of them, if you needed true-blue heroism? Is this job maybe not so spanky clean as they might like?" He gauged her reaction, and gave her a slant-wise grin. "Or isit more that you don't really want 'em knowin' all the particulars here?"

"It's no more your business thanit is theirs," she told him with a harshness that, in someone with less self-possession, might have fallen into shrill. "This is a job, a _job,_ not a fishing expedition into my personal life —"

She stopped. He waited, expression growing predatory in its triumph. "Personal, then?" he said at last, with a softness that somehow seemed more threatening than a snarl would have been. "I can only try to imagine what kind of 'personal' would have you callin' on someone like me for muscle-work."

She sat for several minutes, eyes still level with his, not trying to stare him down but feeling no need to look away while she thought her own thoughts. When she finally spoke, her tone showed displeasure but no loss of control. "Is there any chance you'd be willing to just do the damn job, go back to Giles and the others with them knowing they owe you, and leaveit at that?"

He shook his head slowly, still smiling. "You know me … or my rep, anyhow. Once I've got my teeth into somethin', I never let go. An' I can already tell this one's too juicy to turn loose, so you might as well come clean."

"It wasn't supposed to be this way," she said, and for a moment one might have wondered if she was even talking to him. "I had my life mapped out. I knew where I was going to go, I knew how I was going to get there. Home, hotel, hotel, husband. … And then maybe another husband and my own island, some things you have to play on the fly, but the basic picture was still set. Cordelia Chase, living the sweet life, adored by millions, or at least a select few hundred. Not Cordelia Chase, living on Folgers and Spaghetti-O's and getting a railroad spike rammed through her skull three or four times a week by these _God-damned visions —!"_

Again she stopped, and looked at the man (or not) seated across from her. "What?" she said.

Where before his voice had been soft with sly amusement,it was now the still, dead cold of Arctic night. "Was that supposed to be a joke?"

"Joke?" she said. "What joke? That your 'Yoda' — yeah, I heard about that one — can pillage Europe for a century or so and _still_ not stack up enough loot to afford a decent medical plan for his long-suffering employees? I can't afford the fancy prescription stuff, and over-the-counter isn't cuttingit any more, and why in the world would you think I was joking?"

"The bit about railroad spikes," he prompted, though her tirade had shaken him out of the deadly menace of a moment ago. "It's … not the kind of thing a bloke hears every day."

She gave him a raised eyebrow. "Oh, right, that used to be one of the games you played, didn't it? Boy, you must miss those days."

"More every moment," Spike said.

"Whatever. No, I wasn't even thinking of you, that's really whatit feels like. If this is howit was for your nutso girlfriend, no _wonder_ she went off the deep end."

Now he was shaking his head, and he held his hands up, palms out. "Stop," he said. _"Please."_ She did, and he sighed. "Cordelia," he said on, "might I inquire as to just what the sodding hell you're talkin' about here?"

"Visions," she said. "You know, _vizh-_uns. I heard Drusilla was big on that kind of thing, and I'm not in the least inclined to feel sorry for a vampire but if I was, this would do it. Did she drool? because sometimes, I wouldn't swear toit but sometimes, I think maybe I drool when one hits."

He made as if to lift hands again, then caught himself. "Let me see if I've got this," he said. "You get … visions. And they hurt."

The glance she shot him was scornful. "Well, duh."

"And this has somethin' to do with the amulet you're set on?"

Her laugh was a sharp bark without mirth. "I'm not afterit because I'm that desperate for fashion accessories." Then, collecting herself, she went on. "I've been studying up on it, in the books Wesley keeps piling up in the back office. Saw an illustration, worked out the translation — and just who the hell writes in _Etruscan_ anymore? — and thoughtit might help stop the damn things from hurting so much, but the other texts saidit had been destroyed about 2,500 years ago. Then this morning I got a flash, and once I picked myself up off the carpet I started hunting up somebody who could help me go fetch it, because there's some kind of phase-of-the-moon deal, I don't really understand the whole thing but the upshot is I have to getit and useit _tonight_ or I don't get another shot for … well, I wasn't really clear on that part. Seven years, seven eons, one of the two. Either way, I didn't want to wait."

Spike dipped a spicy wing in ranch dressing and then consumedit abstractedly, crunching the bones between powerful teeth while he thought. "Demon guardians, you said." He looked to Cordelia. "What type of demon?"

"Juwara demon," she supplied. "Really tall, blueish skin, horns on the front of the head, nasty-looking elbow spurs … What?"

Spike was shaking his head. "Not a Juwara demon," he corrected her. "This one's an Altcchon, actually, but the tosser _calls_ himself Juwara. Thinkit means somethin' like 'crushes the lesser beings beneath his hind-claws' in Altcchon lingo, only they stole that from Fyarll —"

"So you've heard of him," Cordelia said.

"Tussled with the sod, 'bout forty years back." Spike sneered. "Strong enough, and he won't quit, I'll give him that, but he's got no … no …" He gestured impatiently, still looking for the right word. "… no _fire._ Just keeps comin' at you, never diggin' into his own guts for the proper energy, never puttin'it all on the line at once. A plodder."

Cordelia weighed the dismissive assessment. "Does that mean you can beat him?"

"Breezin'," Spike agreed … then gave her a rather nasty grin. " 'Course, he'd be well out o' _your_ league. Good thing I'm here, hmm?"

Cordelia scoffed. "Oh, yeah, this is me counting my blessings. Look, I _know_ I'm not built for heavy combat, that's why I made the call to Giles." She frowned, considering. "You're sure this Juwara is _one_ demon?"

Spike shrugged. "Matches the description. I mean, he wasn't guardin' any amulet back then, soit _might_ be a different Altcchon, but even if somebody else took the name, it'd still just be one bloke."

Cordelia was nodding understanding, but didn't look happy. "Well, I don't think it's alone there," she told him. "My vision showed me other demons: runty, scabby grey guys, with sharp little rabbit teeth, but I was seeing numbers, five or six at least. And I'm pretty sure there were some vampires there, too."

"Might be." Spike's mouth twisted in scorn. "Some o' the bottom-of-the-barrel types got no pride, they'll minion for anybody. Not puttin' any fear in my heart." He reflected for a moment. "Not if we run into 'em one or two at a time, leastways. Clustered up, though, along with the greyboys _and_ Juwara … that could be a bit sharp." He raised his eyes to Cordelia's. "Weapons. Big clangin' broadsword, or maybe a double-bladed axe, I don't fancy tryin' to rip through a crowd with just fists 'n' fangs."

"Not a problem." Cordelia stood. "I know just where Angel keeps the heavy metal, we can be outfitted in twenty minutes …" She stopped, glaring down at where Spike sprawled back in his seat. "Oh, give me a break."

"Not done yet," he told her loftily, reaching for another spicy wing. "Can't deny me my small pleasures … 'specially when I can't have the pleasures I'm _really_ thirstin' for."

Cordelia's face was set in a hard mask. "All right," she said at last. "I'll go pay the bill. You come on up front once you're finished."

She wheeled and stalked away toward the cash register at the door. Spike smiled and dipped the wing, this time in the little cup of horseradish. (Vary the sensations, that was the trick, never let yourself get limited.) He wouldn't drag this out here, but there was no reason to rush, either.

Small pleasures, indeed, but pleasing all the same, and worth relishing for what they were.


	2. Part 2

Part II

Spike had to drive, because (Cordelia grudgingly explained) Angel had taken the others in his own car for their current vitally important mission, so that she herself had ridden a city bus to the rendezvous at the diner. Spike waved it away and led her to where he had parked, lighting a cigarette on the way. When she saw the vehicle they were headed for, she stopped dead in the parking lot and blurted, "What the hell is _that?_ I thought Giles was going to get you a rental!"

"He did," Spike told her. "An' I turned it back in 'n' pocketed the deposit. 'Adn't driven Baby here in months, but she was still tucked back in the warehouse when I needed her."

'Baby' was a two-door 1960 DeSoto Adventurer hardtop, battered and dusty but still two solid tons of Detroit muscle car. Both windows were rolled down, and through the passenger's side Cordelia could see by the parking lot lights that the interior was awash in litter. "My God," she breathed, almost a moan. "And I thought Xander's Gremlin was horrendous."

Spike gave her a razor-honed sneer. "Gremlin? Figures. Pansy car for a pansy-boy."

"Styleless-loser car for a styleless loser," Cordelia corrected firmly. Then, with a small, unreadable smile, she added, "But not a pansy. No, sirree."

With the door open, the litter could be at least partially identified: empty cigarette cartons, empty whiskey bottles, old newspapers (_Weekly News of the Warped_ seemed to be a continuing favorite), even a few old pizza boxes smelling strongly of anchovy and jalapeño. Cordelia set her mouth and swept the detritus into the floorboards, then seated herself with the same martyred air she displayed whenever she had to venture — yet again — into the sewers. She shook her head. "You've seriously been driving this scrap-heap since the Sixties?"

Spike had got in on his own side, and now he threw her an irritated glance. "Mm? No, picked it up just before I hit Sunnyhell the first time."

"But … you call it Baby."

The irritated look was stronger now. "It suits me, okay? Like the coat, the hair, the ring, the Zippo." He reached out to caress the dashboard in front of him. "She's a beat-up old bitch, but she'll still power through anythin'. No matter how low I've been brought — which is pretty bloody low, let me tell you — sittin' behind this wheel again makes me feel just a bit like the old Spike."

He cranked up the engine (there, were, naturally, no seat belts) and started out of the parking lot. "Take a left," Cordelia directed, "then cut under the freeway in six, seven blocks —"

"I know where to go," he interrupted, steering one-handed. "Threw down with the Big Poof in the parking garage there, remember?"

"We're in a different place now," she told him. "The old one blew up."

"Really?" He grinned hugely. "Sorry I missed that. Sorry it wasn't me did it."

Cordelia realized she was having trouble seeing out parts of the windshield, and peered closer. By the passing streetlights she could see that much of the glass was blacked over; she rubbed at it experimentally, and the blacking smudged and flaked off. Shoe polish, or something similar, to provide makeshift protection from the sun during the day, then wiped away for night driving …? She shook her head, contented herself with giving terse directions when necessary, and Spoke followed them without comment, lost in some musings of his own.

When he pulled up in front of the Hyperion Hotel, however, he swiveled in his seat to ask, "Why didn't you just have me meet you here? Glad I got the wings, mind, but I don't see the point of fritterin' time away if you're fightin' a deadline."

"Some things …" Cordelia shook her head, almost angrily. "They just have to be a certain way, okay? Part of the whole vision thing." She opened her door and stepped out, still talking. "They come in different types, but you get to know the _feel_ of it after awhile, and this is one where you have to … to shape what you do so you can catch the right moment."

"Yeh, fine, whatever." Spike fell into step beside her. "Just lead the way to Peaches' weapons cabinet, an' —"

Cordelia stopped at the door, fixed him with a gimlet gaze. "Oh, you're not coming inside."

He laughed at that. "What, 'fraid I'll nick the silverware? This'll go faster if you don't have to cart everythin' about, plus I'd like to have a say in what tools I'm to go hackin' with."

She faced him squarely. "And what you'd like means exactly _squat_ to me. No, you're not rummaging around in Angel's things, he'd smell that you'd been there and never stop carping over it. If we do this right, nobody will ever know." She turned back to the door, muttering, "And then _I_ can start forgetting about it."

Spike waited at the door, one eyebrow cocked and a tiny smile turning a corner of his mouth. Well, now. The Slayer talked the same, and Droopy Boy, too, and even Red would toss out a little jab now and then, but this was different. The prom princess here, she didn't just talk the talk, she _hated_ him.

God, he'd missed that.

Cordelia was back in a bit over five minutes, and held up a sword with a four-foot blade and a hilt long enough for a two-hand grip. "Here," she said, passing it over to Spike. "I heard Wesley call this a bastard sword … which means, perfect for you."

He took the weapon, hefted it, nodded approval. Then he looked to her, and his smile broadened. She had tied her hair back in a ponytail, upgraded her footwear to a pair of sturdy boots, and shed the light jacket; now she wore a sleeveless top over cargo pants, accessorized by a _katana_ in a slung sheath and a wicked dagger on her belt. "Well, now," he drawled. "Check out the bloody fashion maven."

"Says the Billy Idol knock-off," she retorted, lip curled.

"Wanker copied _my_ look," he shot back instantly. "An' for once I'm not takin' the piss with you, you're decked out almost practical for a night's work." He grinned. "Real improvement. You've come a long way since —"

"Since I stuck a crossbow in your face?"

He cocked his head. "Huh. Forgot all about that, I had, which should tell you summat as to how impressed I _wasn't_ at the time. No, I meant since I had to watch you go stumblin' through the Mexican backwoods in stiletto heels 'n' a party dress. Thought I'd kill you out of sheer bleedin' impatience."

The flaring of her nostrils showed he had touched a sensitive spot. "You jerked me off the _Playa Principal_," she pointed out flatly. "I was dressed for a summer resort because that's where I _was._ Nobody told me I'd be going on monster safari. Have I ever thanked you for that? I mean _really_ thanked you, the way you deserved?"

His eyebrows went up. "You're actin' like _you've_ got a grudge? You bloody stabbed Dru in the heart!"

"And I'm _so sorry,"_ she wailed in a burlesque of remorse, before her expression hardened again. "… that I used a knife instead of a stake. Look, pull up your big-boy pants, will you? You got your ho-bag girlfriend back from Slumber Putz, I got out of it with nothing worse than blistered feet and ruined shoes — thanks to you! — and now we're here." She stepped closer, almost nose-to-nose with him. "You can't kill me now. And I _probably_ won't kill you. So can we just drop the drama and get on with the damn program already?"

He drew a breath, shrugged with elaborate not-caring. "Lead on, Lara Croft. And just for the record, even if I can't kill you, I can bloody well _splash_ you with whatever I'm rippin' apart on your behalf."

Cordelia's laugh was sharp, scornful, and apparently sincere. "Get real: _Angel_ does that. And I seriously doubt your puppy-tantrums could match the damage that big, soulful dork can do with all his _earnestness."_

Again Spike drove, the blacked-out windows of the DeSoto rolled down for visibility since the sun wasn't an issue. He could have tried to needle her further, but the truth was that this one gave every bit as good as she got, and he was still learning the right balances of verbal aggression when he couldn't back it up with actual physical menace. Besides, the lull gave him time to think. She'd said she had to use the amulet tonight; did that mean before sunrise, or before midnight? Could make a difference … not that it mattered a toss to him personally, but it could help to know what kind of pace they had to follow. Finding the bauble and dangling it out of her reach till the deadline passed would be one thing (and rousing fun, to boot), but not getting to it in time might look like _he_ had failed, and he still had some scrap of pride to try and preserve.

No, he'd probably play straight with her, just to set up further bargains with the white-hats. Depended on what she did with that mouth in the meantime, 'cause he _did_ have limits …

"Look, there, parking space," Cordelia announced, and Spike swung into the spot indicated and killed the engine. They were in one of the seedier areas, pawn shops and head shops and bail bondsmen and …

Spike's head came up, and he drew a long breath, tasting the air, then looked to Cordelia. "A bar?" he asked. "A demon bar, _that's_ where your trinket's hid? Really, hell-fiends today got no self-respect whatsoever. Whatever happened to desecrated churches, buried temples, even a decent underground lair?"

"The thing isn't here." Cordelia opened the car door and got out. "This is just the next step on finding out where it _is,_ at least according to the whang-o-rama in my skull this morning." She held up one hand as Spike reached into the back seat for his sword. "Leave that in the car, and —" She unslung the scabbarded _katana._ "— tuck that up under your coat, okay?"

He climbed out of the DeSoto, walked around it to accept the weapon from her. "So, we're not supposed to be armed in this joint?"

"Not really a rock-solid policy," she answered. "More a matter of they don't like vampires _or_ humans very much. So you don't want to come across as hunting a fight … and, as for me, I don't want any of the regulars to see me and think 'Slayer'. Or, worse, 'dumb bimbo who _thinks_ she's a Slayer'."

Spike made a _Chh!_ sound. " 'Cause take it from me, the original article is bad enough."

The interior of the bar was slightly larger than what Spike remembered of Willy's (though the ferret-faced barman seemed to have fled Sunnydale recently), only more dingy and more smoky and more redolent of many competing odors. In other words, typical demon watering-hole. He stepped past a Hakklusch that was resting its root suckers in what looked like a Bloody Mary ('cept the liquid was probably dissolved nitrate fertilizer, Hakks were dotty for the stuff), and turned in a semicircle to survey the other patrons. "So what're we watchin' for?" he asked Cordelia. "Map, clue, inscription, guide, what?"

"There's a little demon guy who should be here tonight," she told him, low-voiced. "Mottled skin, face like a horned toad's, kind of sunken eyes. According to my vision, he'll be able to tell us about either Juwara or the talisman. I've still got a little cash for bribery, but that'll work better with you here to threaten him."

Threatening sounded good — _violence_ sounded good — but being in a bar turned Spike's mind naturally to thoughts of liquor. He was still carrying Tweedy's deposit from the rental car, he could afford a few good belts, but he had to at least _try_ to get the cheerleader to cover his drinks, if only for annoyance's sake. "Look, long as we're here," he began …

Then he broke off, eyes narrowing, and four long strides took him to the end of the bar where an indistinct figure slumped atop one of the high stools. Spike's hand closed on a narrow shoulder with bone-bruising force, and "Moori-a'ueil!" he cried cheerfully. "Fancy runnin' across you here! An' how's my favorite gutter-sucking lump o' garbage been doin, now?"

The slightly-built demon at the bar tensed under his grip, then slumped further with a breathy, plaintive, "Oh, _man …"_ Then he turned on the barstool — Spike allowed it — and peered up at the vampire holding him. "Goin' by Merl now," he mumbled.

"An' speakin' English, too? Will wonders never cease." Spike added another few p.s.i. of pressure, felt a glow of satisfaction at the resulting wince. "You can go by soddin' Terry Gilliam, for all I care. You owe me fifty quid, you little tosser. Swore you'd have it for me by the end of the week, and that was _four years_ ago."

"You left the _country,_ man," Merl whined, blinking with huge-pupiled eyes. "And burned down the bar where I was supposed to meet you!"

Spike frowned. "Oh, right, the Delzpiyrian business. Tried to tell those bloody priests that a _vampire_ psychic would do sod-all for their poncy prophecy, but there's no reasonin' with fanatics. Followed us clear to Prague, they did …" He shook his head. "Well, since you didn't dodge me deliberate, I won't _start_ by tearin' your arms off. Still, four years overdue, it'll be seventy-five now, mate."

"I don't have —" Merl began, and at the same moment Cordelia stepped up beside them, saying, "Oh, good, you found him."

"What?" Spike said.

"What?" Merl said.

"Hey, fella," Cordelia went on eagerly, "we're looking for a demon and an amulet, and I have it on _really good authority_ that you can tell us something about that, and we can even offer you a little honorarium if it turns out to be good —" She became aware that they were both staring at her, and stopped to add her own, "What?"

Spike was the first to recover. "Turns out I have an unsettled debt with Squidgy here, so if you're payin' anybody it'll be me, seein' as I've got a prior claim."

"But I don't _have —"_ Merl began again.

"No, she does," Spike interrupted. "We'll call it a down payment. So, Altcchon callin' 'imself Juwara, amulet, other little grey bastards hangin' about, any o' that sound familiar?" He leaned toward the lizardish demon. "And 'no' is not a correct answer."

"What, I'm supposed to pay _you?"_ Cordelia crossed her arms. "Not on your unlife, he could tell us anything just to get rid of you."

"Merl here knows better'n that," Spike returned genially. "He'll give us the straight gen or they'll be pickin' bits of him out of the palm trees oceanside."

"No, no, no." She shook her head. "I know you're all kill-and-slaughter-and-then-kill-some-more, but that is _not_ the way we're doing this."

Merl had been looking from one of them to the other, one scaly hand gripping an opened can of Dr Pepper. "So is this good cop/bad cop?" he asked at last.

Cordelia's eyebrows went up. "Oh, was one of us supposed to be good? Guess I missed the memo." She put her elbow on the bar next to Merl. "I was ready to do some friendly negotiation, but Captain Peroxide here seems to have blown that for us, so here's how it is. First, I'm _not_ paying him anything." She cut her eyes toward Spike. "Matter of principle. Second, you I'll pay, as long as you deliver the goods, and if you want to pass the money over to him, hey, that's your biz. Only, I won't open my wallet on faith, we'll confirm before you get anything —"

"Nah, this character'll scarper the moment we turn our backs," Spike objected. "Know his habits, I do, I'm not lettin' him out of sight till I have my dosh —"

_"Third,"_ Cordelia interrupted, raising her voice, "just to be sure of quality control, you'll be coming with us, Merl. How does that sound?"

Again the little demon's eyes were darting back and forth between the two of them. _"Me_ come?" he squeaked. "No, no, that doesn't work for me. It's a bad scene you're headed for, and I'm no fighter, I'd just slow you down —"

"Not askin' you to fight, Squidgy." Spike gave him a gentle shake, just for punctuation. "But you _are_ comin'."

Merl looked around as if hoping for help from some other quarter, but the rest of the bar's patrons seemed somehow oblivious to his plight. "But … what if I don't know anything about this, who'd you say, Juwara?"

"Oh, that would be really bad, Merl." Cordelia leaned toward him. "Because I know you _do,_ so if you said that, well, I'm pretty sure Spike would just start in on his tear-open-and-dismember routine."

Merl looked at Spike, who showed teeth in a happy snarl, and then back at Cordelia. "You'd … you'd let him do that?" he quavered.

"Well, I'm not _supposed_ to," she admitted. "But he's so much faster and stronger and meaner than me, how could I stop him?" She shook her head. "Besides, no way am I getting these clothes splattered with demon intestines, so I'd just have to go somewhere else and get a drink to calm my nerves."

"There we are, then," Spike said as Merl seemed to wilt. "So how's about a location, mate? And any other helpful little details you might have to hand?"

Back in the DeSoto, Merl had to take the back seat, which was cumbersome with a two-door, and uncomfortable due to the trash heaped back there. "Naw, it really is a theater," he was insisting as Spike cut across the city. "Lots of empty properties in L.A., but they never _stay_ empty, you know? Any time some bunch gets settled in and ready to set a routine, here come developers and demolition teams and plans for a new cluster of condos, it just never ends. So, these Kung'r got themselves a sub-lease at a community theater: stay outta the way when there's rehearsals, and do their rituals and stuff the rest of the time."

"Kung'r are low-level twits," Spike said, one-handing the steering wheel while he lit a new cigarette. "Like Lubbers or Lei-achs, can't stand up with the big boys. What would Juwara have to do with _that_ lot of sad-sacks?"

"I really don't know about no Juwara," Merl said again, hanging onto the seat as Spike fishtailed around a corner to beat the red light. "But the Kung'r — the grey guys you described — they _do_ have some kind of amulet they're all proud of, sort of a status thing that they're the ones keeping it safe. And I heard somebody say something to somebody else about a big blue guy, so maybe they hired him for extra security."

"An' what's the amulet s'posed to do?" Spike asked when Cordelia didn't.

"Beats me." Merl seemed to grow more mournful as they got closer to their destination. "Except _you_ couldn't use it for anything."

"No? Why not?"

" 'Cause the only thing I ever heard about it — one of their chants, they really should go light on the erbit lungs in public if they can't stay sober — was about 'focus the soul-force'. Which does you no good if you don't _have_ one."

"Huh," Spike said. "Demons, guardin' somethin' only them with souls can use? That's a stumper."

Merl gave a _what can I say?_ shrug. "Human or not, everybody's weird when it comes to religion."

The found the theater, and Spike parked in front of a fire hydrant. "See, guys?" Merl implored as he levered himself out of the back seat. "Just like I said, I know better than to try anything. I'll just wait out here, you'll see in a couple minutes I was telling the truth —"

"Not happening." Cordelia motioned him ahead. "We go in, we do our deal, you get your money. That's how it works."

The building was unlit: no rehearsal or performance tonight, which meant no humans to worry about. Spike tried the door, found it locked, gave a hard yank that snapped the internal mechanism and tore out part of the door frame. He stood there for a moment, making no immediate move to enter, and Cordelia asked, "So what are we waiting for?"

He had let his true face come out, and he grinned at her now through jagged teeth. "Well, this is usually where I'm ravin' to get inside 'n' kill everything, and somebody tells me no, we need a plan."

"Yeah?" She unsheathed the _katana_. "Here's the plan: go inside and kill everything."

They entered, moving softly, not trying for complete silence but avoiding unnecessary noise; their feet on the carpet inside made less sound than the faint whimpers from Merl. Spike held the sword in one hand and a hardwood stake in the other; he preferred bladed weapons against demons, but with other vampires he didn't have the fine motor control for deft, certain decapitation, and fast kills were what you needed when you were facing numbers. He heard a choking sound behind him, and whirled to tell Merl to sack up and _shut it_ … but it was Cordelia, stumbling blindly and raising her free hand to her head, and he dropped his weapons to catch her as she pitched toward the carpet.

He laid her out with rough care, she was jerking and making little animal sounds in the back of her throat. Merl backed away, gulping, and Spike hissed, "Try to run and I'll gut you!" The little demon froze, throat-sac palpitating in his terror, and Spike dismissed him from consideration and turned his concentration to the woman before him.

One of her visions, had to be. Drusilla's visions had never caused this kind of physical pain, but sometimes the things she saw distressed her greatly, and the similarity was unwelcome. Spike felt no affection for _this_ acid-tongued cow — no regard for her at all, apart from a small, vague hint of admiration for her grit — but to see her like this, writhing and blinded … well, he didn't like it. And liked even less being unable to do anything except wait for it to pass.

Oh, and she'd been right: she did drool a bit.

He could tell when she came out of it; she began making the sounds of someone trying to _hide_ pain, and her hands reached out to steady herself. He helped her upright, demanding, "So what was it? What was so urgent you had to get a warnin' just as we're about to wade into a tussle?"

"I … it …" Cordelia drew a shaky breath, her face still tight and drawn, eyes only just beginning to focus. "Just wait," she said. "Just wait."

Spike waited, seething with impatience and resentment. Where was the fun in seeing someone in pain and not being able to enjoy it? Within a few seconds Cordelia had regained control, and bent to pick up her fallen sword. "We have to give Merl some kind of weapon," she announced. "As in, _now."_

"What? No!" Merl was jittering in his agitation. "I told you, I'm no fighter!"

Cordelia's mouth set. "And when the horde comes to kill us, you just let them know that, okay? I'm sure they'll understand." She was looking around quickly, no panic but plenty of urgency, and her eyes fixed on a long-handled push-broom propped up in a corner of the wide lobby. "There, that thing, _fast."_

It was the work of a moment for Spike to snatch up the broom, strike off the brush attachment with the sword, leaving a sheared point, and toss the makeshift spear to Merl. "Poke that at anybody comes your way," he ordered the wispy demon. "Slow 'em down for a second or so, at least. An' stick close to us, 'cause —" He looked to Cordelia. "Horde comin, you said?"

She took a double-hand grip on the hilt of the _katana_, settled into a ready stance. "Oh, yeah," she assured him. And, almost as if responding to a cue, the horde arrived, bursting through the double doors of the theater auditorium and tumbling down the side-stairs to the upper balconies.

In the first moments there seemed to be scores of them, hundreds — far more than Cordelia had told from her vision — but Spike was instantly in motion, leaping and striking about, and a century of vicious experience sorted it out for him in immediate cool clarity: bit more than a dozen of the Kung'r, five vampires, and Ju-Wanker himself, seven feet of corded blue muscle wielding a fire axe as if it were a camp hatchet. Steep, glorious odds, the only downside being the necessity of keeping Cordelia alive (the bloody Scoobies would be full chaffed if she carked it, and Peaches, too, and that was a set of headaches he didn't need), but that only added to the challenge. His nocturnal vision easily coped with the darkness of the theater lobby; the chit and Merl kept to a central patch dimly lit by streetlight illumination leaking through the upper windows, she'd chivvied the little demon into a back-to-back formation where they awaited attack while Spike ramped about on his own. Juwara drove straight for him, roaring, and he'd have been happy to meet the great Smurf head-on but there were the other vampires to contend with, so it was strike and dodge away and cut at someone else, roll and leap and dart back in for another swing, it was sword and stake and boots and elbows and blood and crunch and screams and dust, and Spike howled his glee and challenge as he gave himself over to the heady joy of slaughter.

He could see Cordelia only in fraction-of-a-second glimpses as he fought his own fight, but those were enough to paint a picture for him. She was only human, and her sword technique was bare-bones basic — maybe even self-taught — but she was quick and coordinated and clearly knew how to channel fear into focus. As the pitched battle passed the thirty-second mark, Spike realized with a spurt of amusement that she was fighting like a cheerleader, shifting as if choreographed from one stance or stroke to the next, and planning every move even if the planning came only an instant before the strike. (Suicide, for any normal fighter, but somehow she seemed to make it work.) The Kung'r were concentrating on her and Merl, he himself had managed to keep the vampires occupied and get in the occasional slash at Juwara, the whole business was balanced on a knife-edge … but now the last of his distractions dissolved into graveyard dust, and finally he could devote undivided attention to the strongest enemy.

"So, coward!" the massive demon boomed as Spike turned to him. "Are you prepared to face me at last in true combat?"

"Coward, is it?" Spike slashed, whirled, slashed again, ducked, thrust, drew back to reset himself. "Brave words, from somebody whose wrinkled blue ass was the last thing I saw scamperin' over the horizon!"

"Lies!" Juwara bellowed from a tusked mouth, and bore down on Spike, swinging the fire axe in great cleaving sweeps. "It was you who fled, fearing to stand and fight as the sun rose!" Spike was forced to give ground: he had the greater speed, Juwara had the greater reach, for the moment it was even. For the moment.

"Izzat how you remember it?" Spike timed it right, caught the handle of the axe against the edge of his blade, and the axe-head spun away as the wood of the handle split from the impact. "Well, you've got your story, an' I've got mine —" His next stroke opened up Juwara's throat, the one after that finished severing the demon's head, and he watched with satisfaction as the twitching corpse flopped to the carpet. "— and now there's only mine."

When he looked to Cordelia, only four of the small grey Kung'r were still alive, circling her with long daggers and probing without evident hope for an opening. Even Merl's frantic lunges with the impromptu spear were enough to keep them back, and they fell away with mournful moans as Spike stalked toward them, fleeing through the door he'd broken to effect entry and vanishing out into the night street. "Well, now," Spike drawled. "Somethin' about an amulet, wasn't there? And just where might that be?"

Cordelia was breathing hard, and perspiration beaded her face, but she spoke without gasping. "What I saw, kind of looked like underground. Don't theaters have storage space under the stage? Let's go, I think maybe I can feel my way to it —"

There was a screech from Merl, and Spike spun toward the sound: a female vampire, erupting out of the fallen Kung'r bodies, one-armed (right, Spike remembered cutting off the other) but her remaining hand drove at Spike with the stake he'd discarded when he'd thought it was just him and Juwara. Fast, the bitch was, Spike might not have got the sword up in time, but she jinked to the side to avoid Merl's feeble jab with the wooden spear, and Spike flashed in an upward cut that transected his attacker from hip to neck … which apparently counted as decapitation, since the vampiress promptly shivered into settling ash.

He turned back at what sounded horribly like a sigh of relief from Cordelia, and she returned his stare, eyebrows up, visibly daring him to comment. "Was that it, then?" he demanded at last. "The vision: that tell you to arm Merl so he'd be just enough to keep me from poppin' my clogs?"

That brought a derisive laugh in reply. "Please," Cordelia said. "If the Powers That Be ever sent me a vision about you, do you seriously think it would be to _save_ you?"

Point, that. He shrugged it away. "Right, then. So: amulet."

She produced a small flashlight from a cargo pocket, and after ten minutes' search she found the amulet, in the below-stage area as she had guessed. "Well, that's done," Spike announced. "What next?"

"There is no next," she answered. "Not one that involves you, anyhow. Let's go."


	3. Part 3

Part III

Outside the theater she gave Merl the promised fee, and he sullenly passed it over to Spike. "I really am sorry you had to fight," Cordelia told the little demon. "We'll take you back to that bar, or anywhere else you need to go —"

"Forget it," he said flatly. "I'll walk, I don't want nothing more to do with you two."

"Look, I'll have Wesley give you a call," she began as Merl started walking away. "He does all our research, he's _sure_ to have something he'll be willing to pay you for. No violence, I promise …" He waved it off without looking back, narrow shoulders tense with anger as he stumped down the sidewalk.

"So, you'll be having a ritual to work with that trinket," Spike said. "You got some favorite dark altar? Need any sacrifices? 'Cause I'm here to do my duty for the purposes of good 'n' righteousness. Virtuous, I am."

"Just take me back to the Hyperion." Cordelia's voice was tired. "Whatever I need to do, I won't need you for it."

Spike drove, drawing on a fresh cigarette, happy and flush with the warm glow of another successful massacre. 'Course, hacking up demons, for him, was like humans eating cotton candy: diverting, but no real substance to it. Still, even if he couldn't kill humans anymore, he was bloody fantastic at killing the things humans feared …

"You hate me," he said to Cordelia without preamble.

"Well, _duh."_ Weary or no, her tone was as sharp as ever. "Is that any surprise?"

"It is, yeh. But not 'cause o' you: 'cause of _them."_ He gestured with one hand. "The others, the Scoobies. No respect there, not even for what I used to be. They're not afraid of me, an' I'm not important enough to hate. I hate _them_ for it, but for you I actually feel a bit grateful. … Mind, I'd drink you down in a heartbeat if I could — 'cept it'd take four or five of your heartbeats to empty you out — but I still _appreciate_ you, 'cause you at least take me seriously." He shrugged. "So I wonder why. Wonder what makes you different."

Cordelia didn't answer right away, but the silence was like pressure building. "Well, let's see," she said at last. "Why don't we start at the Bronze, sophomore year? I'm dancing with this idiot who's been pestering me for years like a brain-damaged puppy, only he's different tonight, stronger and more confident … then he looks at me out of a face I've never seen before, I've known him since kindergarten but now I can tell I'm just a _thing_ to him, and the only reason he doesn't kill me right there is because I get pulled up onto the stage so somebody _else_ can kill me.

"Or later, toward the end of the year, I've got a boyfriend I might actually be caring for, only I find him torn apart in the AV room along with four other students. He'd kissed me that morning, and now he's just spoiled bloody meat, one of the little atrocities you used to do for fun or just out of boredom."

She'd clearly been saving this up for a long time, and she went on, forceful and bitter. "How about when I get kidnapped and hung upside-down for bleeding-out to resurrect the Master? How about when I'm stuck in a closet for hours, praying I'll live through the night, when _you_ raid Parent Night? How about Hallowe'en, when I'm about to die in a catsuit with the school losers? How about when Drusilla and your minions kill Kendra and kidnap Giles and break Xander's arm and put Willow in the hospital, and the only reason _I'm_ alive is because I can apparently break the Olympic record for the hundred-yard dash when I'm scared? Or when you jerk me out of my summer vacation, heinous as that is, just so you can hand me over to some lame demon? Or when I get impaled on rebar because you dragged Xander and Willow off to the factory in some pathetic, dork-tastic play to get back your nutso-slut girlfriend?

"How about when I'm sitting in my chair at graduation, waiting for the eclipse so we can throw down against a giant snake demon, and I realize that _half_ the people I knew in grade school aren't there anymore? dead or crippled or just plain vanished, because of you or things like you?"

She was breathing hard now, energized and animated by this new passion. "Buffy fell in love with Angel, mostly I'll bet because she didn't know when she met him that he was a vampire. Me, I'll work with him and even like him, because he's a good guy and he has a soul and he makes world-class omelets … but I never forget he's a vampire. You? that's _all_ you are, except for being a hell of a lot worse than most. Buffy can take you for granted; she's the Slayer, the thing that kills things like you, she's the star of the show. Xander and Willow, well, they're the supporting cast, they probably figure they're safe if they stay close enough to her. Me, though … I know that, no matter how special I am in my own world, _here_ I'm an extra, I'm a red-shirt, I'm somebody who can die at any moment from bad luck or to up the dramatic tension or even for no reason at all. And if I do, odds are that it'll be something like you that kills me.

"Buffy's strong enough, she can afford to treat you like some bad-tempered junkyard dog. Me, I see a monster in a muzzle. I'll let you close, if I trust the muzzle, but I'll never stop seeing the monster." She looked at him with hard eyes. "And if that comes across to you as respect, well, I absolutely respect you enough to kill you."

Spike laughed, and said, "You haven't, though."

She turned back in her seat to look straight ahead, muttering, "The day may come."

He grinned, feeling a rush of the old hot excitement. All that fire, all that gumption, what might she be like if he could find a way to turn her? And a seer on top of the rest … 'Course, that probably wouldn't last through the transition to vampire, and he _couldn't_ turn her, and even if he did she'd be a full vampire while he still couldn't bite humans, and _that_ would never work out … He snarled softly to himself. Bloody annoying, it was, when reality wouldn't let a good fantasy even get its feet under it solid.

He pulled up in front of the Hyperion and stopped, gave her a sardonic smile. "Here you are, luv. Sure you don't want to ask me in for a nightcap?"

He'd been having her on, of course, but she turned to regard him with a level gaze. "No nightcap. But yes, come on in, I need to send a message back to Sunnydale."

They were halfway up the walk to the front door when she stopped and said, "Oh. Wait here, I'll be right back." She strode back to the DeSoto and leaned into the open window, bending over while she reached across. Spike held his position, appreciating the view it gave him of her backside. Fine arse on that one, and firm, must be that cheerleader conditioning showing again. She straightened up, now holding both swords, and walked back to where he waited. "No, you don't get to keep these," she told him. "Nice try."

Inside the hotel, she wrote out a brief message and sealed it in a blank envelope before passing it to Spike. "There you are, then. Plenty of time to make the drive before sunrise."

Spike favored her with a final parting smirk. "Any last bit you want to throw out, 'fore I toodle on back to my own private purgatory?"

"Yes," Cordelia said. "Tell them this kind of business is exactly why I _don't_ miss Sunnydale."

Then he was gone, and she could collapse onto the lobby couch, feeling all the strength drain out of her.

~ – ~ – ~

She found a bottle of wine in the big refrigerator in the hotel's defunct kitchen. She had better in her apartment — and she'd rather be there with Dennis fussing over her, but she hadn't been about to let Spike know where she _lived!_ — but this was good enough for now. She hurt all over. The ache of overstressed muscles, now, that actually felt good, a reminder of her performance tonight. The visions, though, the visions …

Those were getting worse, she was sure of it. She was far from reaching her limit, but she had no way to know just how bad it could get, even if recent developments might have offered some unreassuring hints.

Too bad the retrieved amulet _wouldn't_ help on that front. All the same, it was even more vital than she'd admitted to Spike.

Most visions showed an avertable threat in the near future. Some carried images from the past, to help in understanding some current problem. The whopper she'd got this morning, though …

That was from years in the future, it had to be; Wesley was visibly older, and Gunn — the young leader of the vamp-fighting street gang — also looked more mature. They were there, with Angel, planning for some big showdown that they might not survive, them and others. A horned, green-skinned demon in a natty suit. A freaky blue-haired insectile woman garbed in form-fitting red leather. (She'd even caught a glimpse of Harmony; good to know the girl had survived Graduation after all, but what was she doing around _Angel?_)

And Spike. There for the planning. There with Angel in some alley, facing off against a mass of demon warriors, and at least one giant, and a _dragon —!_

No Cordelia, though. Spike was on the scene, but not Cordelia.

So, okay. Not around, which probably meant dead. She didn't like that thought, and she'd do everything she could to shape for her own survival, but so far she was working in the dark on that one. But Angel … Angel _had_ to stay alive, and somehow Spike had to be around for that to happen, so that meant Spike, too, had to remain undusted. Not just now — her last-minute vision in the theater had been barely enough warning there — but through some cataclysm months or years in the future.

Thus, the amulet.

Cordelia finished the wine, refilled her glass, and studied the amulet again. It looked like the kind of gaudy, cheap junk some _cholo_ gang-banger would wear, but under her fingertips she could feel the low thrum of the power worked into the metal. At the right moment, this would save Spike so he could go on to save Angel. It had to be the right moment, though, which meant "not now", which meant she'd have to figure out what the right moment was, and then how to get it to him at that time. (Would he recognize it then? Didn't really matter, but she wondered.) She knew, somehow, that she would have time enough to work it out, and some vague nudges in the back of her mind had her wondering if she might set it up through some remote commission with Wolfram & Hart. They were evil, soulless scum, so she'd have to totally mask her own involvement and the ultimate purpose, but she suspected they would be quite reliable if paid enough. Hmm, she might need to beg a favor from David Nabbit on that one …

Spike. She was going through all this to save _Spike_. It was enough to make her gag.

Well, at least she'd got her licks in. She hadn't actually forgot the swords, that had just allowed her to get back to the DeSoto and arrange a little going-away present for him. And the note she'd written for him to take back to Sunnydale just said _Thanks for sending Spike. He's still a jerk, but he actually was useful tonight._ That was an excuse to keep him in the Hyperion long enough for her 'present' to set properly.

Cordelia settled back on the couch, tilted back the wine glass for another long swallow, and smiled. It was a shame she couldn't be there to see the result, but you took your pleasures where you could …

~ – ~ – ~

This time of night, traffic was light enough that Spike had made it onto the highway out with little trouble, and now he zoomed toward Sunnydale at a steady eighty miles an hour. His mood was buoyant; this had been a good night. Spot of righteous violence, touch of extra nicker in his pockets, even the satisfaction of Corpuscle hating him but not able to do anything about it. Why, he'd even got to torment Merl a bit; short of the Slayer helpless and pleading under his fangs, it didn't get much better.

Not that it couldn't be _made_ better. Make another few trips to L.A. to 'help out' the prom princess, and he could start needling Droopy Boy with sly _entendres_ about what he'd got going on the side with the boy's former squeeze. Not to mention the fun to be found in continuing to nark _her_ off, and even a toothless Spike still had all his old skill at being annoying. He'd have to avoid Peaches and his crew, o' course, but that was only a small obstacle, you had to take your pleasures where you could —

His happy reverie faded as something demanded his attention. Something new, familiar, insistent but not at all desirable … Abruptly he yanked his backside up off the seat as the sensation rocketed up from irritating to full-on inferno, _his arse was on fire!_ The DeSoto surged forward at the extra weight on the accelerator, and he fought for control while still holding himself clear of the seat and struggling to understand. God, it burned, it burned like —

_The bitch had poured holy water onto the car seat!_ The leatherette upholstery was decades old, cracked and split enough to let the consecrated fluid soak into the underlying padding and settle downward, only to gradually seep back up under the pressure of his buttocks. God, the seat would take _hours_ to dry, he couldn't spare that time and still beat the sunrise … Bloody hell, the stuff had soaked into his jeans and HIS BOLLOCKS WERE FRYING!

_"You treacherous skank!"_ he shrieked, still laboring to hold his sizzling hindquarters away from the torture below. _"You bloody vindictive slag!_ I'll set your bed on fire with you in it, you filthy cow, I'll contract wi' those Taraka tossers again _just for you!_ Count your days, bitch, doom is comin', death is comin', **oh sweet bleedin' Jesus Christ —!"**

The DeSoto roared down the highway, howling imprecations blistering the air. Then the vehicle was lost in the distance, the wind of its passage fading, and the night was still once again.

—

end


End file.
